In the essay “Mother Tongue” by Amy Tan, Tan claims the idea that we speak different languages to communicate with each other and that our intelligence is judged by the way we speak. As a fictional author, Tan is amazed by language and uses it as a part of her work. Tan observes experiences that helped her notice the different type of “englishes” she uses. As child born in a chines culture, tan had to speak to types of languages. One language she used was academic English, which she learned from the books and used it in a normal conversation Second language, which was only used by her family. Tan’s mother is chines and she talks about “giving respect” in the chines culture with her “broken english.” Tan mentions in her essay about her mother’s …show more content…
The idea of people judging your intelligence by the way you speak I believe is wrong. When my father tries to speak English, sometimes he makes a mistake at pronouncing something. This does not make my father look unintelligent or he lacks education. But when he makes deals with big companies makes me realize how smart he is. Just because you cannot speak a language fluently does not make you look unintelligent. Reading “Mother Tongue” helps me become more patient with my parents when they make a mistake. Before reading “Mother Tongue” I realize that I use make false assumption about people who could not speak English properly. I use to think that if you can speak proper English, you are not well educated. Now I realize that every house has its own language and families have created it to communicate with each other more easily. I believe it is necessary to have a second language, especially if you come from immigrant family like I do. Second language helps families understand things faster. After reading “Mother Tongue” I have also learned to respect people who cannot speak a language properly. I should be more respectful when others are expressing their feelings are sharing something. Also, I should also avoid criticizing people who cannot speak a language fluently. “Mother Tongue” has also inspire me to help other who cannot speak English properly or do not understand the American culture. I know how it feels because I was once new to this country and I know how it feels to be new in United States. This essay made notice that many new immigrants in the United States are treated very unfairly because of the way they speak English. Many Americans make a false assumption that someone who cannot speak English is uneducated. This leads to racist and prejudice behavior, which makes all the Americans look bad in front of other countries and
In the course of reading two separate texts it is generally possible to connect the two readings even if they do not necessarily seem to be trying to convey the same message. The two articles, “Mother Tongue” by Amy Tan, and “Coming Into Language” by Jimmy Santiago Baca, do have some very notable similarities. They are two articles from a section in a compilation about the construction of language. The fact that these two articles were put into this section makes it obvious that they will have some sort of connection. This essay will first summarize the two articles and break them down so that they are easily comparable; also, this essay will compare the two articles and note similarities and differences the texts may have.
The article Mother Tongue, by Amy Tan is a personal look into how language, and the dialects of that language, can affect a person 's life. It 's a look into how the people inside the cultural circles who use dialect derivatives of a major language are treated by people who exist outside of those cultural circles. It shows us how society treats a person using a "broken" or "limited" dialect, and how society 's treatment of these people can also affect the children who grow up using these "broken" dialects. Tan wrote this article try and convey to the reader that English is a colorful, and ever-changing language that has many dialects. Tan makes the point, several times throughout the article, that society judges you based on the type of English that you use. Throughout the article, Tan uses both her mother, herself and society 's treatment of them as evidence to support her idea. The purpose of pointing this out is to show the reader that the language a person uses, whether it be taught to them in school or by a parent at home, isn 't indicative of a person 's intelligence or value, and they shouldn 't be judged as less for using it.
In the story “Mother Tongue,” by Amy Tan, Mrs. Tan talks about (in the book) her life and how she grew up with different Englishes was very hard and how it has affected her today. The setting of the book goes from being at lecture to the past of Amy Tan and her mother along with the different Englishes she had to come accustomed to. In “Mother Tongue” by Amy Tan, the author’s attitude towards the “different Englishes” she grew up with is fascinated. Amy Tan conveys this attitude through wanting to learn all different kinds of Englishes, her use of Englishes in her novel, and the acceptance she developed of her mother’s broken English.
An individual’s background is where one comes from and how he or she is raised. Tan is Chinese American. She has a traditional Chinese mother who speaks “broken” English. Tan states that, “It has always bothered me that I can think of no way to describe it other than ‘broken’, as if it were damaged and needed to be fixed[. . .]” (Tan 43). Tan is an American school girl. As Tan listens to her mother use that type of dialect, it causes her perception of her mother to be distraught. Tan believed it “[. . .] reflected the quality of what [her mother] had to say” (Tan 43). For instance, department store clerks, bank employees and restaurant workers will ignore her mother when they can not understand her. Tan is a writer who loves the use of language. She says, “Language is the tool of my trade. And I use them all-all the Englishes I grew up with” (Tan 41). She is able to adapt her dialect to her audience. With her mother, she uses “broken” English; with her colleagues, she uses correct English grammar.
In the work of Amy Tan’s “Mother’s Tongue” she provides a look into how she adapted her language to assimilate into American culture. She made changes to her language because her mother heavily relied on her for translation. She was the voice of her mother, relaying information in standard English to those who were unable to understand her mother’s broken english. She tells about her mother’s broken english and its impact on her communication to those outside their culture. Her mothers broken english limited others’ perception of her intelligence, and even her own perception of her mother was scewed: Tan said, “I know this for a fact, because when I was growing up, my mothers ‘limited’ English limited my perception of her. I was ashamed of her English. I believed that her English reflected the quality of what she had to say.” (419) The use of standard english was a critical component to Tan’s assimilation into American culture. Standard English was an element she acquired to help her mother but more importantly is was an element that helped in her gain success as a writer. Tan changed her ‘Englishes’ (family talk) to include standard English that she had learnt in school and through books, the forms of English that she did not use at home with her mother. (417-418) Tan realized the ch...
Language can defined the type of person you become and it has an influence on our choices as well as lifestyle. Language itself has become a way of seeing life in a different perspectives. Tan discusses the many ways in which language has played a role in her life and the result from it. I can relate to Tan’s experience to some extent because I come from a bilingual household too. Just like Tan, I am one of my mother’s main source of communication with people who don’t speak spanish. I believe the notion of Tan’s “Mother Tongue” is stating that just because someone who cannot speak the English language perfectly, is considered less intelligent to many compared to those who can understand and speaks it fluently. But what makes us all unique is that it is rare to find two or more people who speak the same exact English. Even though both Tan and I helped our parent and come from different ethnic backgrounds; Tan came from a Chinese family while I came from a Hispanic family. We both share similar ideas about the language spoken in our household, and it was also a big challenge for both of us while we were being raised by an immigrant parent who spoke only “limited English”(Tan
Amy Tan, the author of The Joy Luck Club, talks about in the article, Mother Tongue, how her mother’s broken English would affect her daily life, how people treat her because of it, and how she feels about her mother’s language. She also talks about when she was in school she was pushed towards science and maths because of her cultural background, as an Asian American student; when she really wanted to write English and become an English major. In the beginning paragraph of the article, Tan explains how she has to depict the different Englishes she uses throughout her daily life in writing and how she is able to deal with it. Tan recently learned about the different types of English she uses daily. When speaking to a group of people about her book, The Joy Luck Club, she didn’t realize a difference in the way she was speaking until she saw her mother sitting in the room listening to her speak.
Despite growing up amidst a language deemed as “broken” and “fractured”, Amy Tan’s love for language allowed her to embrace the variations of English that surrounded her. In her short essay “Mother Tongue”, Tan discusses the internal conflict she had with the English learned from her mother to that of the English in her education. Sharing her experiences as an adolescent posing to be her mother for respect, Tan develops a frustration at the difficulty of not being taken seriously due to one’s inability to speak the way society expects. Disallowing others to prove their misconceptions of her, Tan exerted herself in excelling at English throughout school. She felt a need to rebel against the proverbial view that writing is not a strong suit of someone who grew up learning English in an immigrant family. Attempting to prove her mastery of the English language, Tan discovered her writing did not show who she truly was. She was an Asian-American, not just Asian, not just American, but that she belonged in both demographics. Disregarding the idea that her mother’s English could be something of a social deficit, a learning limitation, Tan expanded and cultivated her writing style to incorporate both the language she learned in school, as well as the variation of it spoken by her mother. Tan learned that in order to satisfy herself, she needed to acknowledge both of her “Englishes” (Tan 128).
If you are not fluent in a language, you probably don 't give much thought to your ability to make your personality attractive, to be in touch with the people and be understood in your world, that doesn’t mean you are an underestimated person. Every person has something special to make them more unique, remarkable, and gorgeous between people. The opinions could lead towards success, or those opinions could be one that is losing, and have a negative impact on how people connect with you. In Amy Tan 's “Mother Tongue” she made this book for several reasons. She had started her life by learning language, and she always loved to spend her time to learn language, but this story focuses about Amy Tan 's mother with her terrible English,
Amy Tan’s “Mother’s Tongue” essay fails as a rhetorical essay. This can be proven with a substantial amount of evidence, with a definitive lack of ethos and logos throughout the essay. This makes her point lack a backbone due her lack of credibility and proof. With the lack of these two rhetorical tools she fails to convince her audience of what is truly the issue of the stereotypes Asian Americans face in society and the education system. In failing to do these objectives for rhetorical pieces, the essay loses meaning and it’s message.
English is an invisible gate. Immigrants are the outsiders. And native speakers are the gatekeepers. Whether the gate is wide open to welcome the broken English speakers depends on their perceptions. Sadly, most of the times, the gate is shut tight, like the case of Tan’s mother as she discusses in her essay, "the mother tongue." People treat her mother with attitudes because of her improper English before they get to know her. Tan sympathizes for her mother as well as other immigrants. Tan, once embarrassed by her mother, now begins her writing journal through a brand-new kaleidoscope. She sees the beauty behind the "broken" English, even though it is different. Tan combines repetition, cause and effect, and exemplification to emphasize her belief that there are more than one proper way (proper English) to communicate with each other. Tan hopes her audience to understand that the power of language- “the way it can evoke an emotion, a visual image, a complex idea, or a simple truth”- purposes to connect societies, cultures, and individuals, rather than to rank our intelligence.
In the essay “Mother Tongue” Amy Tan, the author, gives a different, a more upbeat outlook on the various forms of English that immigrants speak as they adapt to the American culture. Using simple language to develop her argument, she casually communicates to the audience rather than informing which helps the audience understand what is being presented at ease. Her mother plays an important role in her outlook of language, because she helps her realize that language not only allows one to be a part of a culture but create one’s identity in society. Amy Tan shares her real life stories about cultural racism and the struggle to survive in America as an immigrant without showing any emotions, which is a wonderful epiphany for the audience in realizing
Amy Tan is the author of the essay Mother Tongue. In this essay, she explains how the power of language has influenced her life through her mother and the experiences they have had together concerning her mother's English-speaking ability, or lack there of. She was born into a Chinese family where both Chinese and English were spoken. She is sensitive to and accepting of people's lingual differences. She talks about how the inability to speak English well in America gives others the wrong impression: "...everything is limited, including people's perceptions of the limited English speaker" (Tan 13). She is saying here that prolific English speakers place limitations on people who have limited English-speak...
The purpose of Amy Tan’s essay, “Mother Tongue,” is to show how challenging it can be if an individual is raised by a parent who speaks “limited English” (36) as Tan’s mother does, partially because it can result in people being judged poorly by others. As Tan’s primary care giver, her mother was a significant part of her childhood, and she has a strong influence over Tan’s writing style. Being raised by her mother taught her that one’s perception of the world is heavily based upon the language spoken at home. Alternately, people’s perceptions of one another are based largely on the language used.
When Tan says that she loves language but she is not a scholar, she does this to make the reader understand her background. By doing this, she preempts the chance that the reader will take her opinion out of context. This is because Tan wants the reader to understand how language can be portrayed in different ways even when the type of language used is limited. The author comes from the strata of Chinese emigrants. She was grown in conditions of ethnic diversity and multilingual environment. Therefore, the issue of mother tongue allows her to understand the